


Skins

by entrenched



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Character Study, Light Angst, Multi, Other Additional Tags to Be Added
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-15
Updated: 2019-10-14
Packaged: 2020-12-16 15:56:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 490
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21038843
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/entrenched/pseuds/entrenched
Summary: Sylvain reached his arms out for a hand to hold and got so much more, for better and for worse.Flashfics of Sylvain and the various people who have (literally) touched his life.





	Skins

Since the beginning, Sylvain believed he knew what love was. 

A caress on the forehead, a stroke of the cheek… and best of all, the cradling of his small hands, enveloped not in high-grade Faerghus furs, but in the bare embrace of his mother’s hands. Her warmth was uncontested, like nothing he had felt before. Only a child, the young Gautier could not put into words the tenderness that raced through his skin when he was with her, but that did not matter. What he felt was in a language all his own, shared only through his little fingertips. 

Sylvain nuzzled himself into his mother’s embrace as she laid her cheek against the crown of his head.

“You are all we could have ever asked for.”

“I love you,” he said softly. Sylvain took his mother’s hands in his and pressed his forehead against her knuckles. “I’m going to go now, Mama,” her son announced happily as he broke into a run. The young boy raced from his mother’s side and through the winding neighborhood path in search of…

“Miklan!” 

He spotted his older sibling by a cobblestoned wall, hunched over a set of weathered wooden toys. At the sound of his name, Miklan’s expression slipped into sourness – his unruly eyebrows crumpled and eyes burned with something Sylvain was much too young to understand.

“Miklan!” Sylvain called again as he moved toward his brother. Young Sylvain edged himself beside his brother and unveiled from underneath his cloak a handcrafted spear. “Look what Mama gave me! She told me Papa said I can have it!” While the blunt edges were smoothed for safety, everything else about the model weapon was very real – fashioned with care only of the finest, for the finest. 

“Must be nice,” Miklan muttered, hardening his stance over his own toys.

“If you want, we can sh-” 

“Fuck off.”

Miklan thrust his elbow into Sylvain, who had been leaning against his brother. Bewildered, the younger Gautier held his model clumsily between his two small hands. Miklan wrapped his hands around the toy and cast it aside. With just enough room between them, Miklan balled a fist and connected it with Sylvain’s jaw, sending the younger sibling into a murky puddle of melted snow. 

“But I…” 

“Tell me, what’s it feel like to be loved just for being alive?” his fists said angrily as they pounded at the bridge of Sylvain’s nose.

To that, the young Gautier could not answer – for, unfortunately, he knew exactly what the answer was: it was bliss. His mother’s touch. His father’s praise. They were all laced with the alluring poison of true bliss and the knowledge that somebody somewhere loved him as deeply as his little heart could contain. Little did Miklan know, as he left Sylvain sputtering blood onto the ground between them, Sylvain would have willingly sacrificed his bliss to hold his brother’s hand as lovingly as his mother held his.

**Author's Note:**

> Uh, this came to me one day and has been staring at me in WIP purgatory, so I’ve set it free. I’m sorry. All the relationships will be added in the tags as I write, because 1) I'm SLOW, and 2) I don't want to bait you into reading this by adding tags that aren't in written form yet. 
> 
> Next: Three’s Company


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